UPDATE - Turkey signals joint defense plan with Russia

UPDATES WITH FURTHER CAVUSOGLU QUOTES ON DEFENSE TIES, NATO, SYRIA, GULEN

By Satuk Bugra Kutlugun

ANKARA (AA) - Turkey and Russia will establish a joint military, intelligence and diplomacy mechanism, Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said Wednesday.

Speaking at Anadolu Agency's Editors’ Desk, Cavusoglu said the previous day’s meeting between Presidents Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Vladimir Putin had paved the way for closer ties following a nine-month freeze after the shooting down of a Russian jet.

“The officials will go to St. Petersburg tonight,” Cavusoglu said. “Our delegation will consist of foreign ministry, Turkish Armed Forces, along with our intelligence chief.”

Cavusoglu said meetings will be held at ministerial level.

Erdogan’s trip to Russia and the revival of ties between Russia and Turkey has sparked concern that the NATO member is turning increasingly to the East as it feels rebuffed by the West over a host of issues such as EU membership and the West’s tepid response to the July 15 attempted coup.

Questioned about increased cooperation between the Turkish and Russian defense industries in the context of Turkey’s NATO role, Cavusoglu said Ankara had already established defense sector cooperation with non-NATO countries, including missile development.

“Turkey wanted to cooperate with NATO members up to this point,” the minister said. “But the results we got did not satisfy us. Therefore, it is natural to look for other options. But we don’t see this as a move against NATO.”

Referring to the Nov. 24 downing of a Russian warplane over the Turkey-Syria border by the Turkish Air Force, Cavusoglu explained that the Turkish pilots involved in the incident had been arrested on suspicion of being involved in the coup bid.

“Some of the pilots, who were involved in the downed Russian jet incident, are remanded in custody right now,” he said. “This is because of the allegation of being a member of the Fetullah Terrorist Organization [FETO], not because they were involved in the incident. The judiciary will look into the case in every aspect and evaluate.”

- Syria plan

Turkey says the coup attempt was organized by supporters of U.S.-based cleric Fetullah Gulen and has called for his extradition, another source of Turkey’s exasperation with the West.

The shooting down of the Russian jet led to a freeze in relations, including economic sanctions and a bar on Russian tourism to Turkey that only thawed in June when Erdogan wrote to his counterpart and the two later spoke by telephone.

On June 30, Russia lifted a ban on tourist flights and Cavusoglu met Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov in the Russian city of Sochi on July 1.

Putin gave his support to Turkey over the coup attempt and said he stood by the elected government, offering his condolences to the victims of what Erdogan called the “most heinous” armed coup attempt in modern Turkish history.

Cavusoglu also touched on Turkish-Russian cooperation on Syria, where the two have supported opposing sides in the five-year civil war.

He said both governments agreed on introducing a cease-fire, providing humanitarian aid and finding a political solution.

“There may be different thoughts on how to apply the cease-fire,” he said. “We particularly do not want attacks that hurt civilians. We also do not approve of attacking the moderate opposition in Syria. We are also against the siege of Aleppo.”

Turning to the coup attempt, Cavusoglu said Turkey had no intelligence on the possibility of Gulen fleeing to another country such as Egypt in the face of a potential U.S. extradition.

“We see the efforts of Egypt in trying to increase its relations with FETO [Fetullah Terrorist Organization] and vice versa but there is no concrete information about Gulen going to Egypt,” he said.

He added that Gulen-linked schools in Libya had been closed down. Following the attempted coup, Ankara stepped up requests for overseas Gulenist schools, which it says finance the terror group, to be closed.

He added: “FETO exerts efforts not only to deteriorate Turkey’s relations with Russia but with all other countries.”